South Korea’s acting President Choi Sang-mok on Monday ordered an emergency safety inspection of the entire domestic airline’s flight system once recovery efforts from the Jeju Air crash are complete.
On Sunday, 179 people died in the worst air crash in South Korea’s history. A fireball erupted when the plane made a belly landing, skidded off the edge of the runway and crashed into a wall at Muan International Airport.
The top priority at this point is to identify the victims, support their families and treat the two survivors, and no available resources should be spared, Choi said at a disaster preparedness conference in Seoul. said.
“We call on the authorities to transparently disclose the accident investigation process and promptly inform the families of the victims, even before the final results are released,” he said.
“Once the accident is resolved, the Ministry of Transport will be required to conduct an emergency safety inspection of the entire aircraft operation system to prevent a recurrence of an aircraft accident,” he said.
Jeju Air Flight 7C2216, which arrived from Thailand’s capital Bangkok with 175 passengers and six crew members on board, was about to land at an airport in southern Thailand just after 9 a.m. (midnight Japan time) on Sunday.
Two crew members survived and are being treated for their injuries.
Fire officials said investigators are looking into bird strike and weather conditions as possible factors in the crash.
Experts say many questions remain, including why the plane was traveling so fast and why its landing gear was not lowered when it skidded off the runway and hit a wall. states.
